


Running Out of Time

by nauticalwarrior



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmate-Identifying Timers, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-11
Updated: 2016-07-11
Packaged: 2018-07-22 23:22:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7457707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nauticalwarrior/pseuds/nauticalwarrior
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Matthias, like everybody else, has two clocks on his left arm. But things are not always perfect, even when you're guaranteed a perfect match.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Running Out of Time

When Matthias turned five, his parents had been dismayed. Matthias himself hadn’t had any clue why, but he knew that something was wrong. Everyone did. But his mother bought him long sleeved shirts and kissed his forehead and told him everything would be alright. 

 

When Matthias was eight, he asked his teacher why his parents made him hide the clocks on his wrist. Why they hated them. His teacher’s eyes had grown a small fraction, and Matthias had watched with confusion she swallowed and took a deep, shaky breath. He’d been about to stomp his foot, insist she explain, when she told him to sit down, and she explained every little bit. Answered his every question. He can still remember some of the words.

 

“When someone turns five, they get two clocks on their arm. One is the timer until they and their soulmate meet. The other is the timer until they die.”

 

And Matthias had understood. He’d nodded solemnly, and grew to both dread and love the clocks on his wrist. Eventually, by the time he was nine, he had take to wearing sleeves just the right length to cover the one near his elbow, but not to cover the one at his wrist. Like most kids his age, he wore that proudly. He would meet the love of his life when he was nineteen years, two months, and six days old. On the day he turned nine years, two months, and six days, his parents had the customary party, and Matthias pretended not to notice his mother crying in the bathroom when he tied ten bracelets around his wrist, a symbol of the ten years until love. The year after, when he’d removed the first one, his father cried too. 

  
  


In high school, his first girlfriend asked about it. They knew they weren’t soulmates, but the relationship was fun, easy. It’s normal to date, as practice, as long as things don’t get too serious. Matthias had wondered if the date of his death was serious, but decided against hiding it. After all, he knew that Emma would live to the old age of eighty four years, seven months, two weeks, and one day. So, he’d pulled up his left arm sleeve to reveal the dark gray brand just below his elbow. 

 

Emma had gasped. “Oh gods! Only three days after?” Matthias had nodded, pulled his sleeve down, and changed the subject. 

  
  


He never showed any of his partners after that, instead shaking his head and letting them assume. A friend of his, once, had asked about it. 

 

“When’re you set t’die?” Berwald never had been very subtle. He wore long sleeves too, full length, and Matthias had known him for years when he finally asked, their senior year. Matthias had two bracelets left, a white one and a red one. He would take the white one off in two days. 

 

“I’ll tell you if you tell me when you’re dying.” Matthias and Berwald argued more than they agreed, but when it was times like these that they were cordial, close even. Berwald nodded, and Matthias rolled up his sleeve. 

 

This time, he spoke first. “I get three days with my soulmate. Well, three days, two hours, and seventeen minutes. I’ll die at four twenty-eight PM, August fourteenth.” Matthias swallowed dryly as Berwald had stared, then nodded. He rolled up his sleeve in turn. 

 

Berwald was meeting his soulmate the very next day. He was set to die in a month. He’d spoken, then, before Matthias. 

 

“I’m going out of town tomorrow. I guess that’s where’ll meet ‘em.” Berwald set a hand on Matthias’s shoulder and smiled. 

 

“At least y’get to graduate.” That was the first, and probably only time, Matthias had felt lucky for his dates.

  
  


Berwald died saving his soulmate, a small Finnish man, from a mugger when the two of them were attacked while walking home. Tino had cried for days, and blamed himself for months. Berwald had never shown him the clock. 

 

* * *

 

Matthias rubs his wrist, twisting a single red band around a clock with only hours left. He hadn’t known what to do, and since he would meet his soulmate no matter what, he’d chosen to go somewhere romantic, a nearby park with hiking trails and a gorgeous scenic overlook of the river. He’d set out early, prayed he wouldn’t trip and hurt himself and have his soulmate be an EMT, and made it to the bench overlooking the town with an hour to spare. Well, now it’s only 30 minutes. Somehow, now that he’s here, it seems like the perfect wait. He’d spent much of his life trying to prolong and rush this all at once, both wanting his love and fearing his death, but now, looking at the winding river and distant city, he thinks thirty minutes is just right. Thirty minutes left of a normal life. 

 

He wonders what his soulmate’s arm reads. Do they live a long time? Do they die early? Matthias hopes that they are lucky enough to have two soulmates. That happens sometimes, when someone’s soulmate dies early enough. Matthias knows of a story like that from a friend of his. His brother’s soulmate had had one before him- when he was four. The clocks had appeared at three, and when the other boy died, the clock at Feliciano’s wrist had turned pale and a second one had started beneath it. Ludwig and Feliciano were happy, but Matthias had heard from Gilbert, Ludwig’s brother, that it still hurt Feliciano to think about his first love. Matthias doesn't want to hurt his soulmate, especially not in death. 

 

The faint sound of humming jolts Matthias out of his thoughts, and he glances at his wrist with alarm. 65 seconds. Suddenly, that thirty minutes has not been long enough, and Matthias kind of wants to throw up. What if his soulmate doesn't like him? What if he doesn't want to date a man with only three days to live? Matthias stands up from the bench, smoothing down his pants (he wore jeans, why did he do that?) and trying to gather his thoughts. Crap. Didn’t he make a plan?

 

Whatever he had planned is out the window. A man steps into the clearing, white blond hair nearly glowing in the sunlight. He isn’t dressed up either, wearing jeans with the cuffs rolled up, a long sleeved blue shirt, and no shoes. He glances at Matthias and  _ doesn’t even look fazed.  _ His eyes are a dark, clear blue. 

 

Matthias should say something.

 

“Hi. I, uh, I think we’re soulmates?” Right as he says it, he can feel his wrist click, like puzzle finally falling into place. The other man’s eyes widen a touch, and Matthias isn’t quite so nervous anymore. 

 

“Hello.” The other man’s voice is quiet, very quiet. He wraps his arms around himself and stops, about six feet from Matthias. 

 

Matthias swallows, trying to prevent his nerves from resurfacing. “I’m Matthias! Nice to meet you.” There. A proper introduction.

 

“Lukas...” Lukas trails off. “Matthias, um, it’s great to meet you, but...” He sounds hesitant, scared. Matthias can feel his stomach sink. Everyone says it’s just a rumour, but what if it’s unrequited? What if his soulmate has someone else? Lukas shits his arm sleeve, and for a moment Matthias doesn’t understand what the black number at Lukas’s elbow mean. 

 

He almost whispers when he finally says something to Lukas. “Three days, two hours, and twelve minutes...” Matthias swallows, letting his arm rest gently at his own arm, shifting the sleeve up so that Lukas can see. The shorter man (he’s quite pretty, actually. Matthias’s type for sure.) doesn’t gasp, but he bites his lip and speaks in an even softer tone. 

 

“You too.” He sounds regretful, and Matthias understands. He just met Lukas, but he doesn’t want him to die. 

 

But something becomes apparent to Matthias. “You die first, look. Two minutes before me.” For some reason, that reassures Matthias. Lukas won’t see him die. But the look on Lukas’s face is one that Matthias can understand, and despite having only just met him, he pulls the smaller man into a tight embrace. Lukas doesn’t even seem surprised, and he wraps his arms around Matthias’s middle, resting his head on his shoulder. They have three days to have the love of their life.

 

* * *

 

 

Time flies when you’re in love. Matthias is sure that this is destiny by now. After the two of them had walked down the trail, they’d sat in Matthias’s car and talked through their whole lives, who they were, what they liked. Apparently Lukas had had the exact opposite thought than Matthias when it came to the clock; he walks that trail every week and wasn’t about to stop for Matthias. That had cracked Matthias up, and he’d laughed for a good five minutes, wiping happy tears away from the corners of his eyes. When he’d looked up, Lukas has a small smile on his lips.

 

But time passed far too quickly. Matthias glances down at his clock, even though he knows exactly what it says. One hour, twenty-two minutes. 

 

“Are you  _ sure  _ we should be driving when it happens? We’ll get in a car wreck!” Matthias can’t  _ believe  _ Lukas’s plan. He wants to be driving down the highway when it happens! In the middle of nowhere!

 

“And if we stay home, there’ll be a gas leak and the house will explode. Or a plane will crash into our house.” Lukas sounds calm, despite the fact that his clock just ticked down to one hour, nineteen minutes. Matthias swallows and goes to answer him, but Lukas speaks first. “We need to leave now, or we won’t get to where I want to be when we die.” Lukas never beats around the bush. He always just says “death” or “dead” or “die” like it’s nothing. Matthias can’t do that.

 

But he can grant this wish of Lukas’s. The other man, a Norwegian as Matthias had learned a few days ago (“Really?! I’m from Denmark!”), couldn’t drive, despite claiming he’d always wanted to die in nature and living in a city. Does an interstate count as nature?

 

Either way, Matthias tries to savor this last hour as he starts the car and pulls out of his driveway (his house is bigger, so they stayed there. Lukas had never bothered moving out of a tiny apartment he got when he was sixteen, and neither had thought college was worthwhile). Lukas looks solemn and thoughtful in the passenger seat, and when he turns to look at Matthias he smiles slightly. Matthias grins at him and pulls out of the driveway, feeling almost free. At least he got three days. Some people never met their soulmates (that had happened to Lukas’s mother. Lukas said that’s why he took his brother and moved away at sixteen. She was never bad to them, but never good either.), and Matthias was glad for every second with his. He turns on his turn signal and speeds up as he gets on the highway, praying that there wouldn’t be traffic. He doesn’t want to die in a traffic jam.

 

Lukas hums a soft tune, and it’s better than any radio. Matthias’s is broken anyways. His forearm reads sixty eight minutes, twelve seconds.

 

There isn’t traffic once they’ve been driving for about half an hour (thirty two minutes and forty eight seconds since they left the house), and Matthias understands why Lukas wanted to be driving. This time of day, it’s not nearly sunset, but the sky looks odd in the best way and the river is clearly visible to their right. It glows almost as brightly as Lukas’s hair did that morning, shining gold in the sunlight. Matthias slows down, not wanting to reach the next city over before they die. His clock reads fifty one minutes and eighteen seconds. (Lukas actually only dies one minute and forty two seconds before Matthias. Matthias hopes it’s painless, for Lukas at least.)

 

Lukas has stopped humming, so Matthias starts. He just hums whatever comes to mind, and he only realizes that he’s starting singing when Lukas sings along. His soulmate’s voice is far prettier than his, but they sound good together, and they keep singing. It’s not any real song, and when Matthias starting singing in Danish, he hears Norwegian spill from Lukas’s mouth, unrhyming and a bit strange, but neither of them mind. One hand on the wheel, Matthias reaches over to squeeze Lukas’s hand. He know the move won’t kill him because he still has seventeen minutes and six seconds left. Lukas knows, and he takes Matthias’s hand and presses his lips to the back of it. Matthias had wanted to die kissing, but Lukas had insisted it was a bad idea, and eventually Matthias had agreed that he didn’t want to spoil their last kiss. He pulls over on the side of the highway and parks for just long enough to kiss Lukas. When they start driving again, he has four minutes and forty seconds left. 

 

When Lukas’s clock has one minute, Matthias finds himself wondering what’s going to happen, because there aren’t any cars nearby. It’s odd. He doesn’t know this road very well though, and it would be nice if the two of them were the only casualties in the crash. 

 

It might be because Matthias is thinking about Lukas’s last fourteen seconds and murmuring “Jeg elsker dig” to his soulmate that he doesn’t see the deer in time. He tries to swerve, only realizing after he turns the wheel that the deer has hit the car already and now he’s going down a hill and towards an army of pine trees. He hears Lukas whisper just before they hit the line of trees.

  
“Jeg elsker deg.” It’s cliche, but Matthias is glad for it as pain overwhelms him. Everything hurts, but he knows exactly what will kill him when something metal from the car drives it’s way into his abdomen. He doesn’t care though. Instead, he looks to Lukas and tries not to cry at the sight of blood matting his pale hair. Lukas looks almost asleep, the air bag ballooned around him and his neck very clearly broken. Matthias reaches out shakily and cups Lukas’s cheek, feeling hot tears (or blood. Could be blood) drip down his face. He tries to stop crying, tries to say something, but he’s running out of time and Lukas is already dead. He’s glad that he thought to say that he loves the Norwegian, because he knows that was the last thing he heard. And as Matthias’s eyes slide shut, he’s glad that Lukas thought to say it to him too.

**Author's Note:**

> Whoops. I hope you enjoyed, and if you did please leave a kudos or a comment!


End file.
